Afghan security forces keep watch at the site of a suicide attack in Kabul, Afghanistan June 4, 2018..(Photo by: OMAR SCOBHANI / REUTERS)

Women, children among victims as suicide bomber kills 12 in Afghan capital

By REUTERS06/11/2018

The Islamic State claimed responsibility for the attack.Taliban's surprise Eid ceasefire is unprecedented, June 9, 2018 (Reuters)

KABUL - A suicide bomber killed 12 people and wounded more than 30 on Monday at the entrance to Afghanistan's rural rehabilitation and development ministry in the west of Kabul, government spokesmen said, as security in the city deteriorates.

The Islamic State claimed responsibility for the attack.

"Woman, children and employees of the (rehabilitation) ministry are among the victims," Najib Danish, spokesman for the interior ministry, told Reuters.

Afghan Taliban militants on Saturday announced a surprise three-day ceasefire over the Muslim Eid holiday at the end of this week, their first offer of its kind, days after the government declared an unconditional ceasefire of its own against the Taliban.

It was not clear exactly when the Taliban ceasefire would begin, as Eid starts when the moon is first sighted, but it will be Thursday or Friday. The government ceasefire runs until June 20.

A week ago, a motorcycle suicide bomber killed 14 people near a gathering of Muslim clerics in the Afghan capital after they had issued a fatwa against suicide bombings, officials said, in the latest in a series of attacks to hit Kabul.

In April, two explosions in Kabul killed at least 26 people, including nine journalists who had arrived to report on an initial blast and were targeted by a suicide bomber.

A week earlier, 60 people were killed and more than 100 wounded when a suicide bomber blew himself up outside a voter registration center in the city.

Militant group Islamic State has claimed responsibility for many attacks in Kabul but security officials say several are much more likely to be the work of the Haqqani network, a group affiliated with the Taliban.